


Yielding

by lightningwaltz



Category: Hakuouki
Genre: Angst, F/M, Orgasm Delay, Woman on Top, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 09:03:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2845472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lightningwaltz/pseuds/lightningwaltz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>This is a night for forgetting, for departing.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yielding

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kazesuke](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kazesuke/gifts).



> So basically you love one of my favorite fandoms and also a lot of my favorite narrative and literal kinks. I hope this is the kind of thing you had in mind (there's angst but I try to heed your interest in fics ending on an upbeat note... and I want Chizuru to be happy all the time anyway!) This is cobbled to together from parts of the Kazama route(s), and some stuff from Zuisouroku. I was undeniably influenced the my musicals' take on Kazama, but you don't need to see any of that for this fic to make sense.
> 
> I hope you have a great holiday season!

Chizuru is left alone with a tattered banner. She clutches it to her heart, but it’s like trying to draw comfort from a ghost. It reeks of gunpowder and blood, mud and suffering. She wonders which of the men had carried it into battle, and what had stopped his heart in the end. 

“Wait.” Her words chase Kazama’s retreating footsteps. It seems like he’ll disappear over the edge of the world. “Please wait.” He pivots halfway to look at her.

“Can you stay here for a day?” Chizuru’s eyes are white-hot, stinging with salt. No matter how hard she holds onto the flag, it gives way beneath her arms. It shifts with the wind, and it’s not nearly tangible enough. Kazama’s rancor for the Shinsengumi is the only other thing left that says they once existed. “If that’s alright.” 

“I had intended to spend the night in this town,” he says. “The next ship does not depart until well after dawn.” 

“Oh.” She pulls herself up to her feet. 

“If you wish to accompany me until I leave, then you are permitted to do so.” 

His pompousness makes her stomach flutter the way it always does just before a good laugh. Strange. All the same, her mind floats just above her body, and so her face remains like stone. 

“Yes. If that is not an inconvenience, I mean.” It’s strange talking to him like they have just met. He has always assumed a level of intimacy with her that she has never granted. She no longer wants to run from him, and she no longer wants to scream in frustration when he speaks, but somehow they’ve both withdrawn behind polite walls.

“No, Yukimura. It would not be,” Kazama says, and she wonders if he’s also too tired for mirth. He holds out a hand as if to beckon her to join him, but pulls it back before she can take him up on the invitation. 

They walk side-by-side, and the world is saturated with noise and color. She’s aware of every distant cloud, and the crunching of dirt beneath her boots. She hears the flapping of clothes set out to dry, and someone’s distant laughter floats down the breeze. Kazama takes long strides, and she watches the sway of his hips. No one seems to notice or care that she’s holding the losing side’s standard. Life marches on, as it has for years on end.

Together they circle the city. She wonders if she’s walking in Hijikata’s footsteps. She wonders if he enjoyed the sight of sunset dusting the rooftops, or if ash and loss had clouded his vision. Later, Chizuru will not recall a single sentence from any conversation with Kazama, even though they must have talked. Kazama also makes certain that they stop to eat She thinks she isn’t hungry, but the rice smells like home and she clears her bowl. 

When they find their way to an inn, she parts from Kazama for the evening (politely; they have become so _polite_ ) and asks herself why she told him to stay. She tries to sleep, holding a pillow over her head. It swallows up most noise, but her muffled sobs resound strangely in her ears, reminding her of a distant wounded animal. Unlike before, it’s a short spate of crying. More of a scream than anything else. It stops as soon as it starts, and her whole body rings with hallowed silence. First, her feet hit the ground, and then her loose hair flows over her shoulders. She leaves her room, but she also wants to leave herself.

She opens Kazama’s door and lets herself in. He’s seated in bed, reading something that he places to the side. It's an oddly domestic sight. She’s not actually sure what he _does_ with his life when he’s not being imperious, or threatening, or chaperoning her across the country. 

“Yukimura,” he says, and- not for the first time- she senses the weight that her surname carries with him. “You are fortunate I recognized your silhouette. Sneaking into my room is a good way to get yourself killed.”

She has no doubt about that. If Kazama wanted to attack her, he would have been waiting for her on the other side of the door, blade in hand. And she would be dead before she hit the ground, demon or not. 

“Then it’s a good thing I came here openly.” 

“But why did you choose to do so?” Kazama asks, and she cherishes his confusion.

She sits on his futon, his feet are in front of her and under the blankets. Her night clothes are all but shapeless, colorless, and this is the first time he’s seeing her outside a well-meaning pretense. She’s not a samurai’s page, and she’s not an oiran, either. Not that she was ever either of those things in truth. It is probably too late to be the last heir of an extinguished demon clan. She doesn’t know if there’s much of anything underneath the roles she’s had to play. 

“The demons are dying out aren’t they?” If she sees Sen ever again, she will ask her if heart breaks at what has become of her people. She’ll ask if Sen has always feels what Chizuru did when she saw that fraying flag. “Clearly your heritage matters to you. Are you sad that it’s so… threatened?” 

“You are correct that the demon way of life is vulnerable. That does not mean I will allow it to remain so.” His way of speaking has always been so archaic. The words pile up, slowly circling their way around one simple meaning. They keep her at a distance, like they’re standing on two distant cliffs rather than sitting in the same bed. “I do not permit myself to succumb to sadness. I make certain to do something productive.”

 _Something productive._ She’s grasping at the blanket, so tight that it slides free from Kazama’s waist. Once she had been a body to him, a vessel to further his ambitions and his _productivity_. She tries to recall her old anger at that, but all that comes to mind are the weeks and months of endless journeying. Sleeping under the night sky with Kazama and Amagiri, or hastily eating breakfast before another day of travel. Once, when Kazama had been simultaneously grumpy and amiable, she had even reached out and pushed his lips into a mock-smile. 

“Is that why you came here? To discuss demon matters?” 

“No,” she says, deciding at last. “Not yet.”

She moves quickly- human-quick, not demon-quick- and kisses him on the mouth. At first she does it for the novelty of it all. Kazama, for all his faults, had always made his intentions perfectly clear. It’s the kind of guise she’s never worn, but she wants to try it on for the space of a few hours. 

She expects him to snicker, or push her underneath him with little ceremony. Chizuru could have tolerated either response, because this is a night for forgetting, for departing. Instead, after a moment of stillness, his lips begin to glide against hers. Kazama’s hands splay across her shoulders, but he makes no attempt to move her in any particular direction. She rolls her tongue against his, and draws his lower lip between her teeth. When her thighs start to ache, she sits down in his lap.

He pulls back, cupping the side of her face.

“From the moment you asked me to remain, you have looked as though you were on the verge of transforming into a demon’s true form.” He play with strands of her hair, his fingers circulating through exact and flowing motions. 

“What do you mean by that?” she whispers. 

“It often indicates that we wish to kill someone.” His hands are almost reverent where they touch her. 

Her body shakes a little, the way it did the day she charged Saito with her Kodachi. “No, that can’t be it. If anything it’s the opposite. I’m tired of war and death.”

“If you are tired of war and death, then you are tired of humans,” he says. “If you entrust your heart to them, then you are destined for sorrow.” 

It’s something Chizuru would contest in the daylight, at a time when her throat wasn’t sore with grief. She’d tell him that he’s a demon that has killed many people. She’d tell him she’s lived as a human and has never wanted to take anyone’s life. They are both anomalies when judged by his stringent standards, and both of them had caused bereavement for others. 

_Maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe demons bring humans grief, and we should not exist._

“I can’t claim to have all the answers.” She says this slowly. “For the moment, I think you should… lie down. Please.”

Kazama edges on back, his head falls back against the pillows. There’s something anticipatory in his eyes, and it’s not exactly desire. It's more reminiscent of the look reserves for respected adversaries.

“I’m not in love with you,” she says, a little sadness seeping into her voice. Her warning sounds antiquated and unfashionable, a relic from the era that had just been swept away. “I can leave if you want.” 

“I am not in love with you, either.” Kazama’s laugh used to frighten her, but no longer. So many things have changed. "And I would like you to remain with me for a while."

Chizuru ducks her head down and presses her mouth to his. She enjoys the smoothness of their tongues, the strange and soft yielding of his lips. She also enjoys the feeling of all his sharp edges, and the way his hip bones rub into her inner thighs. They two of them roll onto their sides, legs and arms tangling. At some point Kazama blows out the light, and the taste of candle smoke is caught between their lips. His fingers are curious and grasping, massaging her until she’s as loose and unencumbered as the blanket threading between between their legs.

“Hold me _harder_ ” she gasps against his ear, and his grip tightens on her back, and in her hair. _Break me down to my base elements, let me **forget**._ And it’s almost possible this way. His arms are like a cage around her, but he’s the one who seems trapped. She thrusts her lower body against his thigh, deliberately over-stimulating herself through all the layers of fabric between them, arching her hips until she climaxes. It’s quick and desperate, more of a vanishing eruption than a steady, ascending peak. 

“Am I correct in thinking that you just…” Kazama trails off. He’s taut in body, taut in voice, taut in spirit, and she wonders what he would do if she left him there. Left him like this. Would he curse he name, or would beg things from her?

She kisses him instead. “Yes,” she says, her lips moving against his mouth. “Can we get out of our clothes?”

“I think-” a throaty groan- “that would be fine.” 

Both of their garments are easy to untie, easy to discard. He’s not especially tall, but right now there’s so much to him. Her palms trace his bare skin, explore the muscles of his arms, traverse the expanse of his chest. They wander down and down, and there’s a sheen in his eyes, a shallowness to his breath. 

He reaches out for her, but she catches him by the wrists and holds his hands away. It’s an unconscious reaction, derived from anxiety, common sense, and years of acrimony. But there’s that spark of interest in his eyes, something that blooms then shies away. She ponders her suspicions, like they’re sour-sweet candy melting on her tongue. 

“Let me do this part,” she says, and he acquiesces. 

She guides his hands up and over her hips and stomach. She tells him how to touch her breasts, and Kazama complies to that, too.

“Do you want more?” he asks. _Do you know what you want? And do you have enough pride to demand it?_ He doesn’t have to speak these thoughts aloud. She feels them in the rigidity in his body, and in the smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes.

Chizuru takes his hand, and places it between her legs “Yes. Here.” She curves her palm against the back of his hand.

“I thought so.” 

It’s peculiar to have an unfamiliar finger taking up such a familiar rhythm. This is something she found relief in many times during those lonely first days with the Shinsengumi. It serves the same purpose now as it did then. With each motion she loses track of who he is, who she is, why they are both here. She hears herself moaning out “good,” because this is almost perfect, this is what she needed.

The closer she comes to the edge, the more she kisses him on the neck. She sucks hard, then draws back, Watches as purple bruises turn yellow then sublimate into his usual skin color. _Yes he is a demon, and I am a demon._ Her hand shakes, and she encourages him to curl a finger into her. Her body sparks with heat, glows with desire, and, for some reason, she thinks what it would be like to claw at him, to make him bleed, and then watch the wounds disappear. 

If only it was so easy for emotional pain. 

Chizuru’s second climax breaks over her, and she rides it out. She says no one’s name, but she clings to his shoulders. When she collapses onto his chest, he holds her like she simply fell into the sky and into his arms. The tautness in his body envelopes her, almost as tangible as a second person. His erection presses against her leg. She maneuvers her body so she can slide her folds along it, but she doesn’t let him inside. Kazama’s eyes roll up, his lids fall shut, and he bites down hard on his lip. This time he does bleed and, yes, the wound heals without a trace. 

“Do you want more?” she echoes his question from earlier, expecting a demanding ‘ _yes_.’ 

Instead, that familiar snarl returns to his upper lip. Gold shimmers in his eyes, then fades away. It’s the face he wears when he thinks someone is asking him to yield.

“You just have to say ‘yes,’” Chizuru says, swamped with unexpected fondness for this man. She wished endearments fit him at all. She runs her thumb along his cheek, then wipes the blood from his face. “All you have to do is say yes. You need this too, and I’ll give you what you want.”

“I can’t.” 

“You can.”

Kazama thrashes a bit, and Chizuru is astonished anyone could need anything from her so badly. She takes his erection in hand, and he lets out a relieved groan as she begins to move. Again and again she brings him to the edge. Again and again he denies her, and so she denies him right back. 

“Alright. Please. Yes.” With each word his voice becomes quieter and quieter.

Chizuru doesn’t gloat, doesn’t go back on her promises. Instead she whispers words of praise, and slides down onto him. It stings to have Kazama inside her, but she likes the way the discomfort swirls into her sense of victory and communion. They rock together, and she keeps her eyes wide open as orgasm quickly sweeps him away into a place even more vulnerable than before. 

They’re quiet afterward, but not awkward. Chizuru sits up to look out the window at the moon, and Kazama strokes her back. His hand falls away, and she looks back to see that he’s sleeping. She pulls on her clothes with steady hands, and returns to her room on quiet, assured feet. 

In the morning, Chizuru takes practical inventory of her body. Nothing feels particularly different, despite crossing many personal thresholds with Kazama. She chastises herself for getting caught up in the moment, and letting him spill his seed inside her. Her sentiments towards him have evolved, but this is not a world for children. Even he might agree with that, lately. She recalls the date of her last menstrual cycle, and decides she probably shouldn’t worry. Not yet.

Her door glides open, and Kazama lets himself in. She can’t chastise him for it, considering her actions the previous night. 

“I can’t,” she blurts out. “Not right now.” 

“Calm yourself,” Kazama says. He takes her hands in his. He’s donned an obscure expression but her hands are warm. Sex does not require love, and love does not require sex. But she discovered certain things about herself last night, and she suspects it’s the same for him.

“I have been asking around town about the fate of the Shinsengumi.” 

Grieving slips into her like a subtle poison. “They were killed in battle. We saw so yesterday.” 

“I believed so too. However, I have discovered that Nagakura and Harada may still be alive. They left the Shinsengumi. I can make no promises as to their fate after that point, but those two humans did not die here.” 

Relief and insidious hope punch her in the gut. She staggers away from Kazama, and he catches her by the arm. But she’s fine. She won’t fall. She’ll keep herself upright, and then she’ll walk on.

“Then… I guess I’ll have to try to find them.” 

“How long will you continue to torture yourself?” 

“You’re also prone to tormenting yourself, if I remember correctly.” And she did, judging by weigh he shifts around and won't quite look at her. 

It makes Chizuru turn and embrace Kazama, until he settles down. “ _Thank you_ This isn’t torture. Please understand that. Not all humans are terrible. These two aren’t.” 

Kazama bends down, and gives her an open-mouthed kiss. She leaps into it, her mind as serene as the eye of a storm. The tears finally come. They wash from her eyes and down Kazama’s cheeks. She’s heart-sore, and exhausted, and a little in love with everyone who’s ever entered her life. 

“I am happy for you,” he says, after they part. “I don’t fully understand, but that is inconsequential. If you handle yourself with the pride of a demon, then no decision you make can be misguided.”

It’s strange, and antiquated, and undeniably Kazama-like. But it strikes a chord in her heart, like the pure notes of a zither. 

“I hope to see a world without war someday,” she says, weighing her words carefully. "But I know that's probably impossible. I still want to lessen the burdens of others." _I could even shoulder your burdens._

“I can believe that of you,” Kazama says, giving her hand one last squeeze. He leaves and shuts the down behind them, but she's sure he'll find her again someday. He's always been good at doing that. Chizuru picks up the banner again. It still carries the odor of blood, but blood can mean life as well as death.


End file.
